The Ambassador's Last Stand

Friday, November 21, 2003

Misguided Anger

Here's hypocrisy for ya: In the name of education, a local group wants to tear down the Ambassador Hotel-- one of L.A.'s top historical sites.

According to the L.A. Times, a group that calls itself RFK-12 wants the LAUSD to tear the old hotel down immediately to build a new school. They say it will take too long to retrofit the Ambassador into a high school, something the L.A. Conservancy has been fighting for.

That just doesn't make sense. Yes, perhaps it will take a little bit more -- and take a little more time -- to preserve the Ambassador. But we're talking maybe an extra year. Saving a year's time by simply destroying an important piece of L.A. history would be tragic. And something the city would look back years from now in regret, just as, if they had to do it all over again, maybe they could have found another way to preserve the Bunker Hill Victorians.